Tom and Joe Are Cranky Neighbors

Missing Joe

Editor's Note:  Cranky Neighbors co-founder Joseph E. Thompson died on Sunday, June 17.  His voice lives on here, and the blog will stay up in his honor for a long time to come.  We hope his friends will feel free to add a comment (below) or write us here at  crankyneighbors@rcn.com to share their thoughts and memories of Joe.  Here, courtesy of his partner Tony is his obit:

Joe Thompson, 56
City Activist, Entrepreneur, Writer

Uncle Joe’s Kids for the Arts Memorial Fund To Be Established in his Honor

Joseph E. Thompson died June 17, 2007 after a two-year battle with brain cancer.

Joe moved to Somerville in 1994, quickly establishing deep roots in a city he said reminded him of his childhood hometown of Pawtucket, Rhode Island. He and his partner Tony Membrino carefully restored one of Prospect Hill’s oldest homes and were honored for their efforts with a city historic preservation award in 1999.

After a 15-year stint as an executive in the air cargo business, Joe transformed his professional career in 1999 by opening Fi-Dough, the area’s first specialty pet bakery and boutique. He continued to operate the business long after the onset of his illness, finally closing it in March 2007.

In the final decade of his life, he was an energetic volunteer for numerous Somerville organizations and causes. His wit, influence, and his always unvarnished advice earned him respect and recognition throughout the city.  His frequent advocacy of a balanced and strategic development policy ultimately won him a seat on the Somerville Redevelopment Authority, where he served from 2004 until his death. In one of many letters to the editor published by local newspapers, he wrote in 1998 in the Somerville Journal that “We must not accept just any development because the leadership is too timid or too accustomed to surviving on less to insist on better.”

He was an active and influential member of Union Square Task Force and Somerville Old House Organization, and was one of the founding members of the Union Square Main Streets, where he served on the board of directors.

Mayor Joseph A. Curtatone, who appointed Joe to the Redevelopment Authority, said that the city had lost “one of its best and most committed public citizens.”

“This is a sad day.  I knew and admired Joe for many years as a friend and neighbor,” said Mayor Curtatone. “He was the best kind of public citizen: totally engaged and totally fearless.  He kept all of us on our toes all the time, and the city is a better place because he lived here.  A lot of people will miss Joe Thompson – and I’m one of them.”

An early and enthusiastic backer of Deval Patrick in the 2006 governor’s race, Joe played a key role in introducing Patrick to Somerville and helping him win endorsements from local officials and party leaders. 

Joe Thompson was passionate about writing and debating about politics and public policy. In addition to his appearances in the pages of the local press, he spoke up often and persuasively at public meetings. Beginning in October 2004, Joe began sharing his views on the web in the Cranky Neighbors blog (www.crankyneighbors.com) he co-founded with neighbor Tom Champion.  In a biographical note on the site, Joe described himself as “an independent, iconoclastic thinker who regards Republicans, Democrats, the rich, the poor, and all sloppy thinkers (roughly 90 percent of the population) with equal degrees of contempt, disdain and amusement. He believes that anything worth saying is going to offend somebody, so get used to it. In fact, learn to enjoy it.” “He never backed down from a good debate,” said Tony Membrino, his partner.

Having himself been introduced to the arts at an early age Joe also understood the transformational power of classical music and theater. He cultivated a thorough knowledge of both genres and was always introducing people to his favorites. Many of his friends and family have Joe to thank for their heightened cultural awareness and appreciation. Of his favorite composer, Joe was fond of saying, “There is no life without Mahler.”

In July, 2005 Joe was diagnosed with glioblastoma, an aggressive brain cancer; doctors told him he had only six months to live.  He made few concessions to his illness, reminding friends of his oft-sated view that “life was for living and that there would be plenty of time to sleep when I’m dead.” Five days after extensive brain surgery, Joe was standing at an altar as best man at his friend’s wedding and dancing that evening with his Mom. Not only did Joe outlive his diagnosis with the help of many people, he inspired everyone he interacted with to live life to its fullest, or, to use a quote Joe often cited from the film Auntie Mame: “Live! Life's a banquet and most poor suckers are starving to death!”

Joe is survived by his mother Rose M. Thompson, his partner Tony Membrino, two sisters; Mrs. Rosemarie (Thompson) Powers of Yarmouth, ME and Mrs. Judith (Thompson) Heerlein of Hamilton, MA, three brothers; John M. Thompson of Cumberland, RI, Malcolm E. Thompson of Pawtucket, RI and George R. Thompson of San Rafael, CA. He was an uncle to seven nieces and one nephew.

His wake will be held on Wednesday, June 20 from the Manning-Heffern Funeral Home on 68 Broadway in Pawtucket, RI. Visiting hours will be 2- p.m. and 7-9 p.m.  Funeral services will commence at the funeral home at 10 a.m. on Thursday June 21, with an 11 a.m. Mass of Christian burial at St. Joseph Church at 193 Walcott St. Pawtucket, RI and interment at Mount St. Mary’s Cemetery on Prospect St. Pawtucket. 

A private celebration of life to honor Joe will be held in Somerville soon after the funeral.

His family and friends plan to find a way to Joe’s life-changing experience with music and theater passed on to Somerville children who otherwise might not ever attend a classical performance, musical, or play. A fund has been established in Joe Thompson’s name that will be used to facilitate these activities. In lieu of flowers, please send donations to: Uncle Joe's Kids for the Arts
P.O. Box 9111
342 Broadway
Somerville, MA 02145

Here are some of Joe’s favorite cultural activities that transformed and shaped his life…See what they can do for you.

Favorite Composers:
Gustav Mahler “There is no life without Mahler” Symphony # 2 and #8
Stephen Sondheim
Beethoven
Shostakovich

Favorite Movies:
The Lion in Winter
Auntie Mame
To Kill a Mockingbird
Harold and Maude
Peter Pan (original stage version)
Dumbo
A Christmas Carol (with Alistair Sim, 1951)

Favorite Authors:
Eugene O’Neil
Shakespeare

Favorite Books:
Common Ground
The Master and Margherita
Dr. Ferris Sermons (Trinity Church)

Favorite Plays and Musicals:
Long Day’s Journey Into Night
The Iceman Cometh
Wicked
Rent
Into The Woods
A Chorus Line
Showboat

Favorite TV shows:
St. Elsewhere
The West Wing
Ugly Betty
Grey’s Anatomy

Guest Post: Unsought Advice to Gov. Patrick

by Hale Champion

Governor Patrick is an admirable and multi-talented leader.  We're lucky to have him.  He's not a very promising professor of journalism, however.  He should let somebody else try to educate the media, often a truly time-consuming task.

As a matter of fact, it looks from here as if the Governor ought to delegate quite a few other tasks as well.  If, as I am reliably informed, he's working past midnight most days, making far too many detailed decisions, large and small, it’s understandable that some of those decisions have been less than perfect.

He is just getting started, of course, and he is more than smart enough to figure this stuff out on his own – and, to be sure, he isn’t likely ever to read this – but I still can’t resist offering the following unsolicited advice:

• Governor, your overriding responsibility is to continue to do what you did in the campaign: stay in touch with your constituents, listen, respond, explain and inspire.
• Next comes informing your colleagues in government about what priorities to set and how to shape the policies and programs that will best fulfill the commitments you made to the voters.
• Let your senior managers and your staff be the wonks and analysts while you focus on the big-picture decisions, on the maintenance of your coalition, and on persuading legislators (not just their leaders) to pay more attention to the public interest than the lobbyists.  (And please note that they don’t respond to lectures any better than reporters and editors do.  Your persuasion will have to take other forms.)
• On drapes, cars and all the other small stuff that can so quickly consume your waking hours and the media's agenda, delegate all but the final choices (red or blue, Ford or Chrysler) to people you trust (and who have been through the political mill, which is like no other).  You can't watch your own back and, except in the crucial matter of your physical safety, you can't assume the State Police will do so either.  Look around you:  you’ve got very good, highly experienced people to do things for you (or, if you don’t, then you need to look to your recruitment and personnel practices).

And, oh yes, empower and encourage at least one of your trusted colleagues to tell you when you are wrong – and then take at least 24 hours before you go ahead anyway.

Iraq: Hello, We Must Be Going

By Thomas P. Champion

Here’s the problem: no matter how skillfully Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid manage the newly Democratic Congress, their ability to pick up the pieces will be cruelly limited as long as George W. Bush continues to ignore the message of the 2006 election, the will of the people, the rule of law, and the dictates of common sense.

As long as the Bush regime continues to lie about nearly everything – and official Washington (including the media) treats those lies as if they were a legitimate basis for discussion and debate – things aren’t going to get much better.

Take Iraq (please): Having rejected the obvious way out offered by the Baker-Hamilton Council of Elders, Bush and Co. are now busy pre-selling a “new” Iraq policy that would include:

• an apparently temporary increase in troop strength around Baghdad (don’t say “surge” – that’s just Pentagon jargon elevated to Bushspeak);
• new military leadership;
• a jobs program for unemployed Iraqis; and
• a new emphasis on small-unit counterinsurgency tactics.

We’ve already started hearing about some of the more obvious flaws in this approach, including the facts that: there wouldn’t be enough troops to make a difference; nobody’s willing to talk about exactly how long we’d maintain the new troop level; it won’t work unless Iraq’s own legitimate security forces get vastly better incredibly fast; or that we also need more troops in Afghanistan – where they might actually make a difference.

We’ve even started to hear the entire plausible objection that this “new way forward” is a cynical construct designed to give Bush the ability make the claim that “We’re making progress, but we must give our new approach time to work” (and keep making it until he leaves office). 

But the very worst thing about the “new way forward” is that it is still predicated on a set of lies and deceptions about Iraq – its government, people, and prospects – and about the nature of our options there.

If you want to know how bad things really are, you need look no further than the video of Saddam Hussein’s execution, which appears to have been carried out not by nonsectarian, independent agents of the central Iraqi government, but by members of a Shiite militia controlled by Moqtada al-Sadr.  As Frank Rich notes in the Sunday New York Times (reg. rqd.), this guy is a classic Islamic fundamentalist terrorist thug, whose “Mahdi Army” has clashed repeatedly with U.S. forces, killing the son of Cindy Sheehan along with dozens of other Americans.

The government of Prime Minister Maliki cannot rein in, or even criticize, Sadr because he is too important to the ruling Shiite coalition – yet this is the government that Bush’s “new way forward” is designed to uphold.

Sure, it might still be possible for the United States to impose a military solution on Iraq (and dethrone Sadr and the other new mini-Saddams).  But we would have to reinstate the draft, raise taxes, put our economy on a war footing and assemble a massive aid plan (our prior efforts having been squandered in an orgy of corruption and profiteering).

Does anyone really think our nation is up for all that?  And short of that all-in approach, does anyone really think we can “win” in Iraq?

We can and should think outside the box on counterinsurgency, but we also need the same kind of creative thinking on the wider political (partition, anyone?), diplomatic and military fronts.  Everybody but Bush and his dead-enders understands that, by the Bush definition, we can’t “win” in Iraq.

Our inability to achieve a neo-con “victory” is in no way due to our fighting men and women.  They have performed heroically in an appalling situation, and the best way to honor their sacrifice is to get them the hell out of there, and fast. 

We can be smart, we can be tough, we can be creative – but we must be going.

Breaking News: Healey Warns of WMD in Milton; Mobilizes Pride's Crossing, State Police for Invasion

by Joseph E. Thompson

BEVERLY (VIA REUTERS) - Kerry Murphy Healey, acting on what she termed "incontrovertible evidence" from various local and Washington sources, accused Democratic gubernatorial candidate Deval Patrick of hiding weapons of mass destruction in the basement of his home in Milton, thus posing an imminent threat to towns ranging from white enclaves in Dorchester to all of North Shore horsey country.

Ms. Healey made her announcement this morning from the turret of her mansion in Pride's Crossing.

When queried on the cause of her suspicions, Ms. Healey cited Mr. Patrick's record as a civil rights attorney. “Those he chose to defend, whether free or incarcerated are prime candidates for conversion to terrorist activities.  The question is: do we want to elect a man who supports them as our governor?

At this writing Pride's Crossing police are examining chemistry sets found in Patrick’s cellar. His protests that they are left over both from his daughters’ high school classes and his own at Milton Academy were said by Ms. Healey to be” obvious subterfuge.”

Ms. Healey went on to tie her own candidacy to the security of the people of Massachusetts:

"Deval has no credibility when he claims that our justice system depends on effective advocacy for the accused and convicted as well as for the state.  Guilt schmilt!" Healey declared.  " As we have come to know - particularly over the past six years - civil rights is a concept wholly inconsistent with Republican values. This is a slam-dunk. Deval Patrick and his Milton basement are a clear threat to our way of life here in Pride's Crossing as well the liberty of the entire Commonwealth.  (And, if that doesn’t ring true, then Deval also stands for the rape and pillage of every pinched-faced blond woman east of Albany.) I want to assure my fellow citizens that , once I am governor, guilt or innocence will be established long before trial and without the interference of messy constitutional issues.”

Patrick responded that if Healey would come down from her high horse and actually visit Milton, he would be happy to show her his basement.  He also volunteered to clear off the ping-pong table and invited Healey – in the spirit of bipartisanship – to play doubles with his family.

“This is a matter that should be debated one on one,” Healey retorted, “and anyway, Deval is obviously too out of step with the mainstream to understand that if I got off my horse, I would be stuck in the house all day. Who would want that?”

While she did seem open to ping-pong, she remained adamant about horse lovers’ rights.

“My election as governor would not only eliminate the chemical weapons in Milton, but also balance the interests of five day commuters with those who can perform dressage more than one morning a week.”

According to Prides Crossing Police, no arrests are immanent, but the situation is being closely monitored by the North Shore Defense Department and the Large Animal Rescue League.

Paid for by the Committee to Promote Negative Advertising

By Thomas P. Champion

Over at Blue Mass Group, they’ve got a wonderful “negative campaign ad” from Jimmy Tingle.  It’s definitely worth a listen.  Jimmy swiftboats Jesus Christ, reminding us of his soft-on-crime, prostitute-befriending, feed-the-poor ways.

Jimmy’s negative spot reminds us that one of the best ways to respond to outrages like “Inmates for Deval” is to use humor as a weapon.  So I have a modest proposal: let’s pepper the Kerry Healey camp with over-the-top satirical ads that reveal what’s really going on in this campaign.

We can create our very own 527 group – The Committee to Promote Negative Advertising (not affiliated with any candidate) – and get right to work.

Here’s a sample script:

Voice over grainy B&W photos of Deval and his homes: “Deval Patrick says he grew up poor, but did you know he’s filthy rich? Attorney General Tom Reilly says Deval’s vacation home should be called the “Taj Deval” and many experts believe that, with a 50 million dollar price tag,   it was built to house illegal aliens and furloughed prisoners in gold-plated luxury.”

Man on Street “Deval doesn’t really understand business, so I guess he must have tricked Texaco and Coca Cola into giving him all that money.  He couldn’t have made it on his own.”

Woman leaning out of minivan:  “That Patrick guy says we shouldn’t roll back income taxes until we fix the economy and reinvest in cities and towns.  Sounds to me like he’s just trying to protect his rich friends in big business.”

Voiceover:  “Deval Patrick:  No black man should have this much money unless he plays professional sports.

“Paid for by the Committee to Promote Negative Advertising.”

And another:

Voice over pictures of cute kids in Halloween costumes: “It’s time for Halloween, when many children go out trick-or-treating as superheroes, sports stars, princesses, firemen and other positive role models.”  (Add somber background music, show pictures of shadowy figure running down darkened street.)  “But did you know that, when he was a child in far-off Chicago, Deval Patrick went trick-or treating as Blacula, the hideous black vampire who sucked the blood of innocent victims, destroying their souls and condemning them to an eternity of torment?  Now Deval Patrick says he wants to be our governor – but can we trust someone who would rather be a vampire than a hero?

“With Halloween around the corner, shouldn’t Deval’s shadowy past come back to haunt him?

Deval Patrick: did we mention he’s black?  BWWAHAHAHAHA!

“Paid for by the Committee to Promote Negative Advertising.”

                                                            ####

Okay, your turn.

Guest Post: Second Place is Still Up for Grabs

by Hale Champion

If Christy Mihos has fifteen million dollars and is willing to spend it, he could well finish second in the gubernatorial campaign – still far behind Deval Patrick but ahead of his GOP rival.

Kerry Healy made a nervously brave try in the opening debate, but Mihos was a lot happier and a lot feistier.  He may turn out to be a bantam-weight version of former Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura.  Just like Ventura, Mihos seems to think that the old political maxim, “Give’em a show or give’em a fight,” should really be “Give’em a show and a fight.”  Mihos provided both in a single performance.

Unfortunately for both Mihos and Healy, Deval Patrick already looks like the Governor most of the voters in this state have been yearning for: friendly but firm; articulate but not garrulous; informed but not a wonk; a listener, but ultimately his own man.

Elections are never done deals until the polls close on the first Tuesday in November – and sometimes (alas) not even then.  But if Patrick continues to campaign as energetically and effectively as he has ever since he first came out of the blue less than two years ago, Beacon Hill denizens should start thinking about when instead of if.

More Cigarettes, Fewer Cell Phones

by Joseph E. Thompson

I escorted a friend to a wedding at which I knew no one very well. It was rather a formal affair. My job was simply to eat, fetch a round or two of drinks and be charming – all, save the last, easy jobs.

The affair was at a Cambridge hotel and must have cost the host a fortune but, in the spirit of good health and political correctness provided only an outdoor space for outcasts like me to relieve the tension of amiability with a quick smoking break. So, in between the cocktails and the toasts I availed myself of an opportunity to fortify myself by trotting downstairs to the courtyard and igniting.

As I sat puffing, a woman appeared, cell phone attached to one ear, MP3 detached from the other. She was probably about thirty, nicely dressed and apparently quite willing to treat both myself and anyone else within earshot to – well, why not join me in listening in to the cell phone conversation that cascaded over the entrance to the hotel?

“I can’t f-----g win.” Pause.

“I can’t f-----g win.” Pause.

Silence – about a minute.

“I just can’t f-----g win”

“This is just f-----g bulls---.”
“This is just f-----g bulls---.”

Silence.

I disposed of the cigarette in the attenuated urn provided, and preceded back up the escalator to my mushroom ravioli and filet mignon.

As I did so, several things occurred to me about this incredibly rude woman: the first simply that her ten-word vocabulary apparently exceeded her brain cell count; the second that her, to be kind, lack of skill with the language might narrow the range of her thinking, and that perhaps this mental constriction was not limited to her.

So between the tomato and basil salad and the ice cream cannoli, I devised a theory that will take up the next three posts.  Here’s the first installment:

On Terror: It’s the Uniform, Stupid

For all of the talk about “freedom” and “democracy” that we have heard lately from the Bush administration, it seems odd to me that we have been so willing to become slaves, and at great cost, to a single word – terror.

No, I am not going to call our addled Vulgarian-in-Chief a terrorist – which puts me one moral leg up on the Bush administration official who used that epithet to label the teachers’ union. But I am prepared to guess that she, along with many others, has swallowed the Bush hook along with the line and sinker.

According to the Idiot Prince, terror is what other people to do to us. Just as we never torture anybody (waterboarding, stress positions, extreme cold notwithstanding) so also we never inflict terror.  No, we prefer to shock and awe.

According to the Emperor Shrub, terrorists are defined by what they do; motive and context are completely irrelevant. If you oppose anyone who claims to be against terrorism then you are, ipso facto, on the side of the terrorists (which give us the right to tor-, I mean, interrogate you strenuously).

But if that Bush official were here – or even that sparkling conversationalist on the cell phone – I would pose the following pop quiz:

Here is a short list of historical events:

1. The burning of Atlanta
2. The firebombings of Dresden and Tokyo
3. The nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

For thirty points, what do these events have in common?

Answer? Each was an act of terrorism directed against civilian populations by the United States. Each resulted in the mass killing of what we – depending on our mood – call “innocent civilians” Casualty estimates range from the most conservative of 20,000 to the highest of 105,000 for each occasion.

Those few instances come to mind purely because they are the most obvious and because our own people were the ones with their fingers on the triggers. Others, requiring a deeper grasp of history, had more or less the same effect – although the most obviously dirty hands in many of those cases belonged to the surrogates who, with U.S. encouragement and support, undertook the torture, killing and overthrowing of elected governments.

In Chile (I would hasten to inform the young lady who helped open this essay that, beyond being a bowl of spiced beans, Chile is also a country in South America), after we sponsored the assassination of Salvador Allende, we helped install General Augusto Pinochet who miraculously made 76,000 of his own people disappear. Our response? Utter silence.

We could go on with similar stories ranging from Nicaragua, Guatemala (United Fruit anyone?), Iran – where in 1953 we installed the Shah – to Iraq. Knowing full well that Sadaam was using chemical weapons against his own people, we sent Donald Rumsfeld over to shake his hand and re-supply him.

Lest we go too far afield, it also bears mentioning that the KKK and other organized lynch mobs retained their power though tactics that can only be described as terror against their fellow citizens. (Recently there was a museum exhibition of postcards published from photographs taken of the lynchings of African Americans. Despite many efforts, the federal government refused to condemn these – dare I say it – terrorist acts, and only apologized for this “oversight” two years ago.) 

The point I am making is that terrorism is a tactic, a time-honored tactic, that the United States, our allies and our enemies have employed again and again. Our criticism of that tactic revolves largely around the uniform worn – or not worn – by the perpetrators. In U.S. history, the propriety of terror derives from the circumstances under which it is inflicted and not from any particular aversion to the tactic itself. Oh I suppose it is true that we can be offended viscerally by the cruelty of the executions – the beheadings, building collapses, etc., but the victims of our terrorist acts are no less dead.

The relentless invocation of a single word without any honest exploration of its meaning is a form of demagoguery that – if used to maximum effect – gets idiots elected, sends us to ruinous wars, kills and wounds hundreds of thousands and, most importantly, blinds us to the sometimes obvious solutions to problems that are intractable only because we are too busy name-calling to see them.

Guest Post: Early Returns

by Hale Champion

Let me offer a final word (give or take a few) before Tuesday's Democratic primary.

Actually some of what follows really comes originally from Tom, but he's been more than busy elsewhere recently.  And since I don't intend to identify which of us is responsible for any small beam of light or incidental error of fact, judgment or spelling, you'll just have to guess which thoughts are mine and which are his.

Here, however, is our combined take on the race for Massachusetts Governor:

Unless the polls and the pundits are completely wrong – which happens less often than some might like to believe – Deval Patrick will emerge as his party's chosen candidate.  Since all trends also point to a November rejection of the Romney-Healey tradition of economic royalism, that means that Massachusetts will have a remarkably good chance to say an unfond farewell to almost two decades of do-little (and sometimes do-worse) Republican governors – and to the "same old, same old" culture of Beacon Hill.

One of the most crucial and overlooked factors in that likely (although by no means guaranteed) outcome has been the Patrick campaign.  It’s easy to make fun of political campaigns: they’re long, expensive, loud, nasty and can often veer off the most important issues to focus on irrelevant trivia.  But campaigns matter – a lot.  They tell us a lot, too, especially about the leadership capacity of the candidates.

The primary campaign just ending was remarkably revealing, much more so than its recent predecessors. Despite all the political maneuvering, the costly avalanche of look-at-me commercials, and the yammering of the debates, this campaign showed clearly who had the organizational skills, the capacity for leadership and the street smarts to lead a complex and diverse state like Massachusetts.

Forget the résumés and the fancy packaging.  Look at how these candidates handled their current job – running for governor.  Who has assembled the resources, organized the support, honed the message, created a broad-based alliance, and triumphed at every milestone – the caucuses, the convention, the debates?  Who has gotten results?

Clearly, the answer to all those questions has to be “Deval Patrick.”  The other two candidates each brought some personal merits and credentials to the contest, but just as Patrick's campaign revealed his balanced strengths, theirs exposed important weaknesses.

Patrick, a little-known outsider, was almost alone more than two years ago in believing that anybody could be competitive with two- term Attorney General Tom Reilly, his four million dollar war chest and his longtime relationships with the state's major political and business insiders.  Patrick saw a need and desire for new blood in the State's Democratic leadership.  After consulting with apparently just a few likeminded people, he decided that the new blood could, and should, be his.

His chosen strategy was not to begin with the state's traditional power brokers, most of whom had already agreed that it was Reilly's "turn".  He rolled back the astro-turf of modern politics and replanted a truly grass-roots movement among those who felt shoved aside, rolled over or just plain ignored.  He listened and responded with the skills developed in a successful career in both public and private life.  He gradually assembled a precinct-level organization which proceeded last winter to dominate the party’s local caucuses in almost every part of the state.  The delegates chosen there rewarded him at the state convention in the spring with a resounding first-ballot endorsement – despite the fact that most Massachusetts voters knew little or nothing about him at the time. Then he went anywhere and everywhere to introduce himself – to listen some more, and to raise enough small-contribution money in the early summer to pay for TV ads in the late summer and early fall.  And all along the way he won endorsements and formed powerful partnerships with his campaign slogan, "Together We Can".

Compare Patrick’s campaign performance to those of his rivals.

Reilly's was unusually defective both in design and execution.  Patrick seems to have taken him totally by surprise, and he just never caught up.  He didn't plan or organize for the caucuses and even such powerful allies as Boston Mayor Tom Menino failed to anticipate the strength of the Patrick insurgency.  By the time of the convention, he had conceded the endorsement to Patrick, making clear to the press and the public that only his ties to the so-called super-delegates (people who held government or party offices rather than being elected at the caucuses) assured him of enough votes to qualify for the primary ballot.

In the meantime, Reilly made a huge, panic-driven mistake.  At almost the last moment, he pulled out of discussions with Christopher Gabrieli to be his running mate as a candidate for Lieutenant Governor.  Instead, he chose a minority woman state legislator and Menino favorite, Marie St. Fleur.  Within 48 hours, public stories about fiscal problems involving her and her family forced her withdrawal and soon thereafter there was another candidate in the Governor's race: Gabrieli himself.  It's been all downhill for Reilly ever since.  He's gone negative on both his opponents, taken tax and other positions usually associated with Republicans and fallen into third place in the polls.

Gabrieli is an unusual case.  A very wealthy man who set a fifteen million dollar cap on his primary campaign spending, he had already spent millions in two prior, and unsuccessful, efforts to win public office.  This time he thought that his past problems (generally ascribed to deficits of charisma and dynamism) would be solved by getting a not-so-free ride on what then were thought to be the long, strong coattails of the Attorney General.

Now, to Gabrieli's credit, he saw an opportunity in Reilly's suddenly visible weakness.  He had more than enough chips to afford a new roll of the dice. If he could wheel and deal for the l5 per cent vote of convention delegates needed to get on the primary ballot (which he did with the connivance of some Reilly voters looking for a potential backup), then he could buy a virtual campaign without having to go to the trouble of building any real political base.  If Reilly continued to make more mistakes like agreeing to help get Gabieli on the ballot, the latecomer's saturation TV campaign could be aimed at Reilly's lapsed adherents as well as the inattentive voters who weren't even tuned in yet.

Gabrieli could also hope that his own great personal wealth would discourage Patrick's fundraising efforts (which it didn't) or that Reilly's negative attacks on Patrick would take a heavy toll on both the attacker and the attacked while leaving Gabrieli largely unscathed.

Gabrieli"s campaign met some tests, but it failed on a big one.  He has the resources to buy a lot of persuasion and he has a plan, but he hasn’t been able to build up or organize support because either he just doesn't know how,  or he hasn't got the patience, to do all the necessary listening and responding and working it out on a personal one-to-one basis.  As any salesman can tell you, mass media advertising can get you in the door, but it can’t close the deal.

Of course, the real test comes on Tuesday.  But based on what we’ve seen in this campaign, who has shown the insight, the inspiration, the elbow grease, the wisdom, the organizational skills and the willingness to buck the system that we claim to want from a governor?

To become governor, first you have to campaign for governor.  And Gabrieli is right about one thing: it’s all about getting results.

Guest Post: Bad Business

By Hale Champion

Many – perhaps most – of this nation’s captains of industry may be honest and reasonably ethical, but you'd be forgiven for thinking otherwise if you based your opinion on a perusal of the front page of the New York Times business section – especially the August 4th edition.

Every item teemed with evidence of greed, fraud, duplicity and mendacity.

In the featured top left column was the story of an incredibly convoluted illegal tax avoidance scheme engineered by some con artists masquerading as lawyers and accountants on behalf of two entrepreneurial brothers from Texas.

The brothers have declared their intention to take the Fifth. Tens of millions of dollars are involved.

Across the top of the page above the fold was the story of the bitter court fight over whether Richard Grasso, the resigned-under-pressure head of the New York Stock Exchange (laughingly classified until last year as a non-profit), is entitled to $80.6 million in compensation and $119.8 million in retirement benefits from 1999 to 2002. Apparently a lot of this was based on (could you guess?) "improper accounting" techniques.

At the top of the right hand column there was an explanation of why charges of illegal handling of stock options are anticipated by New York prosecutors against one Jacob Alexander, the chief executive officer of Comverse Technology.  This article also notes that more than 80 other companies are caught up in comparable investigations of stock option manipulation, one of them being the trendy Apple Corporation. (Update:  Alexander and two others have now been indicted and Alexander is on the lam.)

Another major story, this one placed modestly below the  fold, outlines how insurance firms are trying to dodge billions in payments for wind-related structural damage from the Katrina catastrophe.  The problem is that the coverage offered by the salesmen differed rather sharply from what was contained in the close-to-impenetrable small print of the policies they were selling. The salesmen told the buyers that all wind damage would be covered, but didn't add that there was a clause, known as "anti-concurrent coverage", that if the buildings involved were also affected by either a flood or an earthquake, such wind damage claims would not be honored.  The claimants have lost the first round in court: in the unlikely event they eventually see some money, it won't have helped when it was most needed.

We are being told that the scandals arising from Enron and Tyco and their fellow havens for white-collar crime are pretty much behind us – so far behind us, according to lobbyists and their friends in the Bush Administration, that the strict regulatory regimen they brought about should now be relaxed.  Sure.  Why not?  If the business of America is business, as we've been told from time to time, why not let it be monkey business?

P.S.  Inside that same Times business section there was another story about how the American Amicable Life Insurance Co. (yes, that's the real name) has agreed to pay back $70 million to settle State and Federal complaints about "deceptive practices" in selling policies to members of American armed services both at home and abroad.  It's nice to know that friendliness can be retroactively enforced.

Observation Posts

(Editor's Note: My father and veteran guest poster Hale Champion is sick and tired of the fact that nobody posts around here anymore, so he's decided to help us out by passing along an occasional quick note about his travels through the daily news and the political blogosphere.  Bsides, he's noticed that most bloggers (and their readers) seem to prefer the short, pithy entry to the thousand-word essay that Joe and I have used to drive away so many customers.  That alone gives him a big advantage over  the rest of us at Cranky Neighbors. - T.C.)

Please Move Calmly to the Nearest Exit Strategy

by Hale Champion

In the entirely understandable event that most of you have forgotten (or have never read) my guest post of October 12 about how Democrats should propose that the U.S. deal with  Iraq (Cutting Without Running), let me refer you to last week's op-ed piece in the New York Times by Peter Galbraith.  It offers a much better informed, but remarkably similar, set of ideas. Unlike my piece, it focuses strictly (and properly) on international policy rather than domestic politics – although no Galbraith would ever forget their importance.

Galbraith simply combines his own detailed knowledge of the region with his personal experiences of the Clinton-era U.S. role in the Balkans to produce a reasoned suggestion about how to cope with a comparable religious, ethnic and nationalist conflagration in Iraq.

It should be further noted that Fareed Zakaria, the conservative, but otherwise intelligent Newsweek foreign affairs expert who fell off the Bush manure spreader some time ago said Sunday on ABC that Galbraith's approach was "smart".  Given the carnage elsewhere, however, it seems unlikely that anybody else is paying attention to what is becoming an even bloodier situation – a situation in which our errors of commission are having even deadlier consequences than our errors of omission in the Israel-Hezbollah-Lebanon crisis.

The Noble Savage

by Hale Champion

I hope people will notice and appreciate that the Incredible Shrinking Boston Globe finally has a Washington reporter who reminds one of the distant glory days when Tom Winship ran the paper.  Charlie Savage is the byline to look for.

He made his big splash with a seminal and deeply researched story on President Bush's profligate and abusive use of “signing statements.” Savage’s story actually shamed a few other news organizations into covering the more than 750 instances in which Bush has used these statements to completely negate popular legislation, thus avoiding the issuance of vetoes that could be overridden. (The most blatant example was the infamous statement accompanying Bush’s signing of a bill forbidding torture or violations of the Geneva convention.  Bush simply said the law in no way constrained his actions or policies, making his signature, and the law itself, completely meaningless.)

More recently Savage has turned with equal care and lucidity to a detailed account of how the Bush administration is busily neutering the civil rights division of the Department of Justice.

Who cares if Anne Kornblut has taken her Beltway gossip, sloppy reporting and conventional wisdom to the Times?  Let's just hope the Globe keeps Savage and hires more like him to cover state and local government.